Such an assembly is known, for example, from German Patent Application DE 198 58 490 A1 (U.S. Pat. No. 6,621,575 corresponds). That document describes an assembly for the simultaneous optical illumination of a multiplicity of biological cells, each forming samples, by means of a light source made of luminescent porous silicon. This luminescent porous silicon is part of a luminous disk referred to as a nanosource array, which has a biocompatible adhesion layer for fixing the cells. The nanosource array is formed by a multiplicity of so-called apertures in the luminous disk, which are partially filled with the luminescent porous silicon. In this case, the luminescent porous silicon forms a surface with the rest of the luminous disk, so that it is directly next to the biocompatible adhesion layer.
A similar assembly for the illumination of samples is known, for example, from German Patent Application DE 199 40 752 A1. According to FIG. 4 of that document, this assembly consists of a sample support, for example a biochip, and a so-called system module which contains all of the components needed for illumination onto or through an array of samples arranged on the sample support. The assembly may be connected to another system module for optical analysis of the measurement signals output by the sample support.
The former system module for generating the light field has a matrix arrangement of light sources which, for example, may be formed by a microlaser array or a microdiode array. The effect achieved by interconnecting this multiplicity of microlight sources is that a luminous matrix with luminous points of uniform intensity can be produced on the sample support in order to optically analyze the individual samples.